Need or not? - Contractor Talk - Professional Construction and Remodeling Forum

mercenary · 07-26-2009, 06:18 PM

I am intersted in starting my own general contracting business and I was wondering if it is advisable to buy autoCAD.

Any Advice?

Thanks in advance!

Ben

**Leo G** · 07-26-2009, 06:31 PM

Couldn't hurt. But do you plan on doing your own drawings, do you have any schooling in drafting? It might be beneficial for small drawings for which you probably will be able to do. But full house or larger drawings really need someone who has knowledge of this.

There are many smaller CAD programs that will let you do drawings to show your clients that aren't as complex or have a high learning curve.

ScipioAfricanus · 07-29-2009, 09:51 AM

I would not go to the expense of buying AutoCAD. There are other programs out there that are based on AutoCRAP but are MUCH less expensive like BricsCAD, ZWCAD or any of the other software that are "IntelliCAD" based.
All of these will open DWG or DXF files (AutoCRUD files) to allow you to work on them.
Try ProgCAD (Google it) also. They have a FREE version for 2D stuff that is IntelliCAD based. It mostly works and looks like AutoSCAT.
You might even try out DoubleCAD XT from IMSI the people who make TurboCAD, I think it is still free.

Andy.

**Leo G** · 07-29-2009, 10:01 AM

Gee Andy, you seem to not like AutoCAD for some reason

mics_54 · 07-29-2009, 11:12 AM

I have to agree with Andy